The Costs and Financing of Teacher Education in Malawi (CIE, 2000, 57 p.)

(introduction...)

Multi-Site Teacher Education Research Project (MUSTER)

Abstract

1. Overview of National Issues

2. Recent Development of the Teacher Education System

3. Current Status of Colleges

4. The System of College Funding and Sources of Costs in Colleges

5. Internal Efficiency of the Colleges

6. Selection, Admission and Placement of Untrained Teachers

7. Analysis of Teacher Supply and Demand

8. Cost per Trainee Analysis

9. Postscript on Recent Developments

10. Conclusions

References

2. Recent Development of the Teacher Education System

The teacher education system in Malawi developed from missionary
origins. In 1973 there were 13 teacher training institutions with a capacity of
2,019. Only two of these were run by the government whilst the rest were
church-owned. These small institutions were gradually rationalised so that by
1993 there were 7 with a capacity of 2968. All except two were government-run.
By 1998 the number had declined to six and capacity had fallen to 2,730.
Enrolment was generally less than capacity.

The basic requirement for enrolment into primary teacher
training has been a Junior School Certificate. Candidates can accumulate grades
over several years if they do not pass at the first attempt and are still
considered as a result of a shortage of better-qualified applicants. In the past
applications for teacher training places were advertised as and when new intakes
were planned. The Ministry then shortlisted the candidates for interview. At
interview the candidates were screened to establish suitability and check the
authenticity of certificates. Successful candidates were notified in writing and
advised which college they should report to. In the colleges trainees pursued
the same courses regardless of whether they held a JCE or an MSCE certificate.
Table 2 below shows the total enrolment in primary teacher colleges for
1st year and 2nd years by sex and grade from 1991/92 to
1995/96.

Table 2: Total Enrolment in Primary Teacher
Training Colleges by Sex and by Course of Study 1991/92 - 1995/96

1991/92

1992/93

1993/94

1994/95

1995/96

Course

Male

Female

Male

Female

Male

Female

Male

Female

Male

Female

T3

1,148

623

1,198

982

1,214

944

963

467

996

475

T2

1,035

539

949

415

921

545

896

659

798

685

Total

2,183

1,162

2,147

1,397

2,135

1,489

1,859

1,126

1,794

1,160

Both sexes

3,345

3,544

3,624

3,085

2,954

Female students made up 35% - 39% of the total. From 1991/92 to
1993/94 there were fewer female students holding MSCE certificates than female
students holding JCE. However from 1994/95 there was an increase in females
holding MSCE to 46% of trainees. Between 1991 and 1996 enrolments fluctuated
because one college was converted to train secondary teachers and another was
upgraded to university status.

Candidates with JCE graduate with a T3 qualification, and those
with MSCE graduate with T2 teacher qualification. After successfully completing
the courses, newly qualified teachers are posted to different districts by the
Ministry depending on the demand. The District Education Offices then distribute
the teachers to different schools. It is not clear what criteria the DEOs use in
allocating teachers to schools because the primary school system has a very
uneven distribution of teachers. At the school both T2 and T3 teachers are
required to teach all subjects in any one standard from Std 1 to Std 8. Despite
going through similar courses and having similar workloads at the school, T2
teachers receive a salary 25% higher than the T3 teachers.

Table 3 shows the output of the colleges3. These
figures do not necessarily translate into teachers going into schools. Some
decide to join other sectors of the job market.

3 These output figures are
those listed in the official statistics. They appear high when compared to
college enrolments. This is because of the transition between course types and
duration over the period. For part of the time a one year college programme was
in place.

The tutors in the colleges have a variety of qualifications
ranging from certificates to graduate level degrees. Table 4 shows the number of
tutors and their qualifications in teachers' colleges up to 1996.

Overall numbers of staff have fallen since 1995/6 as one College
has been converted to secondary teacher training and another has become a
University. From the table it can be seen that a high percentage of the tutors
do not have degrees but teaching diplomas and certificates. Many of the tutors
started their careers as primary teachers and were trained at this level.
Subsequently a substantial proportion has acquired higher-level qualifications.
There has been no specific programme to train teacher trainers. In 1995 there
was a student population of 2,954, and a tutor population of 289, which gives a
1:10 tutor: student ratio. Although this looks a healthy ratio, morale among the
tutors has often been described as low because of lack of promotional and
educational incentives (MIE and MOEC, 1991).

Teacher training in Malawi government colleges was originally
designed as pre-service training lasting two years. This was called the normal
programme. Trainees were holders of JCE and MSCE certificates without any
previous experience. This programme required candidates to spend one and half
years in college and 6 weeks in schools doing supervised teaching practice. From
1981 to 1987 the output in all the colleges was about 700 to about 800 trained
teachers per year.

In 1987 the Special One-Year Teacher Programme was introduced.
The main aim was to train all untrained teachers in the system. Enrolment was
restricted to candidates who were already teaching as untrained teachers. In the
first year the training was conducted in two colleges. In subsequent years the
special programme was confined to the newly constructed Domasi Teachers College
only. In the first year 626 untrained teachers were certified and about 400 were
trained in the second year (Nyirenda, 1988). The special programme was run
concurrently with the normal two-year programme in different colleges. Only one
college had both programmes running at the same time. Nyirenda (1988) and later
Neumann (1994) noted that the special one-year programme was a replica of the
two-year normal programme with two years of work squeezed into one year.

A new teacher-training programme called the Malawi Special
Distance Teacher Education Programme (MASTEP) was launched in 1990. Its
objective was to train 4000 primary school teachers in three years. This
programme was supplementary to the 'normal' two-year programme. The rationale
for introducing this programme was that the school enrolment growth rates had
increased and that projections indicated that there would be a shortfall of
7,000 trained teachers in 1993. It was therefore believed that the most
cost-effective option for producing such a teaching force was by instituting a
distance mode programme in addition to the 'normal' programme.

Candidates for the programme were selected using entry
requirements similar to the two-year 'normal' programme. After oral interviews
trainees were registered as external students in teachers colleges and sent to
schools to start teaching while at the same time studying self - study
materials. The course lasted three years during which time students had
supervised teaching three times per year; residential courses for two months a
year; seminars and workshops twice a year; and lastly project write-ups and
course work through the distance mode. Assessment was both continuous and by
externally administered final examinations. After resits 99% of students passed
the programme, yielding about 3,900 new teachers. About 75% of the costs of
running the programme were used for student allowances and salaries and only 25%
were spent on operational costs (CERT, 1995; MASTEP, 1994). An adjustment is
needed in simple costs of this kind to reflect the fact that students spent two
terms a year teaching in schools. The programme ended in 1993.

MASTEP and the two-year 'normal' course were unable to meet the
demand for primary teachers. The Modified Normal Teacher Programme was
introduced in 1993 as a result. In this programme recruits first had to teach
for one year before being selected for one year of college work. In many
respects this was a resurfacing of the one-year special teacher programme. In
effect the 'normal' pre-service programme was abandoned and replaced by the
modified programme. The curriculum for the modified programme was a two-year
course compressed into a one-year course and suffered from complaints that it
was overloaded as a result. This programme was discontinued in 1996.

The current system of training was introduced to meet the needs
for teachers created by the introduction of free primary education. 18,000 of
the 22,000 recruited were untrained representing about 42% of the teaching
force. The pressing problem was how to train these newly recruited untrained
teachers in the shortest possible period of time. The arrangements that were put
in place were initially ad hoc. Eventually the Malawi In-service
Integrated Teacher Education Programme (MIITEP) was designed with the express
aim of training the 18,000 untrained teachers between 1997 and 2000. All other
forms of primary teacher training were then suspended.

The trainees for MIITEP are required to have a JCE or MSCE
certificate, pass an oral interview, undergo an orientation course, and teach in
primary schools for at least a year. They then qualify for a programme over six
terms, the first of which is residential in a College. For the next five terms
they teach under the supervision of school and zonal level staff and complete
assignments and projects. At the end of this period they sit a qualifying exam
during a one-month period at Colleges. Further details of the programme are
given below in subsequent analysis. Insights into the initial operation of the
programme to orientate untrained teachers are contained in Kunje and Stuart
(1996). Further analysis of the MIITEP curriculum in action is available in
Stuart and Kunje (2000) and Chirembo and Kunje (2000)

MIITEP remains the only system of certifying new primary
teachers. It is clear from this historical account that it has several
precursors in previous programmes and that similar kinds of mixed-mode courses
have existed before. Its introduction was a necessity brought about by the
announcement of free primary education and the accompanying enrolment growth.
The question now is whether it will be continued in some modified form to meet
future demand for teachers or whether other options are financially viable that
could supply sufficient numbers of new teachers to meet
demand.